Before going to bed I read Oswald Chambers’ devotional on “Friendship with God” which I will copy and paste further below. Although I read that one before and would believe it was true, I always felt that there was something missing. God who does neither act logically nor chronically as we might like it, revealed the missing piece to me a few hours before I would read this devotional.

Yesterday as I was on another prayer walk, I felt rather numb. My heart was saddened and my mental condition was pretty low, too. Having prayed since July last year for my teeth’s situation to improve, God never gave me a clear answer, instead, my situation got worse and worse. Was it only one tooth that has been aching since July 2016, last week even six teeth caused me more and more pains. Indeed, I can hardly count how often I would find myself at the dentist since then. The dentist really tried everything he could to help me, however, even a visit at the oral surgeon did not seem to be that promising, either. I often thought, ‘There must be something wrong here….’ Meanwhile I sense I am in a similar situation this woman we meet in the Bible had been in, too.

And behold, a woman who had suffered from a discharge of blood for twelve years came up behind him and touched the fringe of his garment, for she said to herself, “If I only touch his garment, I will be made well.” Jesus turned, and seeing her he said, “Take heart, daughter; your faith has made you well.” And instantly the woman was made well. (Mt 9:20-22 ESV)

To be honest, I do not have this kind of faith this woman had been given by God back then. It is so clear to me that there is nothing inside me that can change this little-to-none-faith into the faith of Jesus Christ. Nothing!!

But back on topic. On Sunday in the afternoon, as usual I headed to the “Alte Veste” Tower in Zirndorf. Having arrived there, I went slowly and halfheartedly upstairs (169 stairs, as always). On top of the tower the wind was blowing and the sky was all gray. As I had tried before, I was seeking a deeper connection with God which has been quite difficult lately since my pains have been very distracting. At that moment I suddenly realized that God had pointed me several times to a certain number lately, even just now as I had passed a car at the bottom of the tower. I perceived that there was the number 37 on its license plate. What a strange number I thought before… The only thing that immediately came to my mind was that my father was born in 1937. Nonetheless, as I had become more curious yesterday, I checked it on the internet of my cell phone. Biblical numerics (http://asis.com/users/stag/numbtabl.html) told me that # 37 stands for “The word of our Father”.

‘Interesting’, I thought, not sure what to do with this information yet. ‘Isn’t Jesus the Word of our Father?’ I wondered. As I was discouraged due to a lack of an immediate answer from God, I wanted to give up on it and drop my thoughts about it, too. But God said,“Wait! I’ll show you what I mean.”Not that convinced that something would really happen, I leaned my elbows on the stony railing around the tower, watching some chickadees that were flying from one top of a tree to another. Suddenly I got aware of a man whom I had met in the tower a few minutes before. I recalled that he had been on his way downstairs with his small son on his shoulders, explaining him what they could see from the windows in the tower. Now they were standing before the entrance door of the restaurant. I observed that this small boy was hellbent on opening the door all by himself. Yet this big and heavy wooden door could not be opened by him. As much as he tried, the door remained closed.

Photo by Susanne Schuberth

I believe this little boy had the will, the idea and plan, and I assume the feeling that he could open the door, too. Yet he could not! He was not strong enough nor was he able to reach the door opener with his short arms. Finally, his father who stood behind him cautiously pushed the door open so that this boy and he behind him could enter the restaurant.

I understood immediately that it is God who opens the door and answers our prayers. Also, nobody can enter the kingdom of God but by His grace. It is never our own doing, our trying hard and struggling that opens a door that is too heavy for us! It is God Himself who draws us closer to His heart so that we want to get to know Him as He really is, not as our anxious and sorrowful hearts might suspect Him to be when we realize that He did not (immediately) listen to our pleas. With these thoughts that everything happens by God’s grace alone in mind, I dare to paste Oswald Chambers’ insightful devotional here now, eventually.

The Delights of His Friendship. Genesis 18 brings out the delight of true friendship with God, as compared with simply feeling His presence occasionally in prayer. This friendship means being so intimately in touch with God that you never even need to ask Him to show you His will. It is evidence of a level of intimacy which confirms that you are nearing the final stage of your discipline in the life of faith. When you have a right-standing relationship with God, you have a life of freedom, liberty, and delight; you are God’s will. And all of your commonsense decisions are actually His will for you, unless you sense a feeling of restraint brought on by a check in your spirit. You are free to make decisions in the light of a perfect and delightful friendship with God, knowing that if your decisions are wrong He will lovingly produce that sense of restraint. Once he does, you must stop immediately.

The Difficulties of His Friendship. Why did Abraham stop praying when he did? He stopped because he still was lacking the level of intimacy in his relationship with God, which would enable him boldly to continue on with the Lord in prayer until his desire was granted. Whenever we stop short of our true desire in prayer and say, “Well, I don’t know, maybe this is not God’s will,” then we still have another level to go. It shows that we are not as intimately acquainted with God as Jesus was, and as Jesus would have us to be— “…that they may be one just as We are one…” (John 17:22). Think of the last thing you prayed about— were you devoted to your desire or to God? Was your determination to get some gift of the Spirit for yourself or to get to God? “For your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him” (Matthew 6:8). The reason for asking is so you may get to know God better. “Delight yourself also in the Lord, and He shall give you the desires of your heart” (Psalm 37:4). We should keep praying to get a perfect understanding of God Himself.

May we never fall prey to the error that we would be able to seek God on our own apart from His blessings! Our human nature is not that way. When we are sick and ask God to help us, there is nothing wrong about it because it is biblical at that (see James 5:16). However, I doubt that there is only one human being apart from Jesus Christ who automatically searches for God Himself in situations where everything which is good has been eclipsed for a certain time. I also think the story of Job can teach us a lot here. Nonetheless, dear reader, if you have come to know me a bit, 😉 I feel I need to issue a caveat at the end of this article as well. Please, be cautious with CIC, that is, Christians in charge, 🙂 who seek God’s blessings and try to get hold of them without being changed into Christ’s image through the cross themselves! Let me finish with apostle Paul’s words of admonition here.

“I appeal to you, brothers, to watch out for those who cause divisions and create obstacles contrary to the doctrine that you have been taught; avoid them. For such persons do not serve our Lord Christ, but their own appetites, and by smooth talk and flattery they deceive the hearts of the naive. For your obedience is known to all, so that I rejoice over you, but I want you to be wise as to what is good and innocent as to what is evil. The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.” (Rom 16:17-20 ESV)

Amen.

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19 thoughts on “Hope… in spite of it all”

Susanne, I am glad that you shared this Chambers writing about friendship with God and your own experiences as well. I know how prolonged pain can make it hard to sense our Father’s presence (as you well know), being I have had back problems for months that have debilitated me. Yet, I have been getting some moments of relief since my operation last October. Somehow, I have to believe that even all this pain and suffering will be used by our Daddy in our lives to conform us into the image of His Son.

I also read this devotional by Chambers yesterday and was touched by the following…

“‘Shall I hide from Abraham what I am doing…?’ When you have a right-standing relationship with God, you have a life of freedom, liberty, and delight; you are God’s will. And all of your commonsense decisions are actually His will for you, unless you sense a feeling of restraint brought on by a check in your spirit. You are free to make decisions in the light of a perfect and delightful friendship with God, knowing that if your decisions are wrong He will lovingly produce that sense of restraint. Once he does, you must stop immediately.”

I can see how O.C.’s counsel here could lead some to think that they can do just about anything they desire and still be pleasing to God, yet I am not coming from that mindset. What I am seeing in the above excerpt is spoken of in the Psalms…

​”Delight yourself in the LORD, and he will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the LORD; trust in him, and he will act.” (Ps 37:4-5, ESV2011)

If we truly have made God our delight, our heart’s desires will be pleasing to Him. First we must grow into a place where we no longer seek only those things that WE delight in. Praying for God to change our hearts by HIS grace is the first step. I find that I often have prayed for my own desires first instead seeking and asking for what is pleasing to our Father. He desires us to walk in the light of His will just as Jesus did/does. Christ was the Firstborn of many brethren and He showed us if we are to be HIS disciples how important it is to seek only the will of our Father in our lives. It is only with these new hearts that we will find “a life of freedom, liberty, and delight.” If we listen to His voice and obey that sense of His restraint in our spirits as we start to go astray we will find ourselves to be friends of God and those who seek His face.

“I Will Change Your Name”

by D. J. Butler

I will change your name
You shall no longer be called
Wounded, outcast, lonely or afraid

I will change your name
Your new name shall be
Confidence, joyfulness, overcoming one
Faithfulness, friend of God
One who seeks My face

“If we truly have made God our delight, our heart’s desires will be pleasing to Him.”

As you rightly pointed out, we need a new heart that has been changed by God so that He has become our (only) delight. I had some thoughts about this… We know that children want a lot of things from their parents, but it is not good to give them all they long for. If a child only comes to his father in order to get something, he misses the point. I believe our Daddy in Heaven wants to make us see and experience that He will NEVER withhold anything which is truly good and acceptable from us when He is our NUMBER ONE.

Oh how often I have prayed for healing in my lungs, Susanne. Any song or writing or scripture that speaks to the ‘breath of God ‘ touches me to the quick. How often I hold my right hand over my chest just below my neck, knowing, trusting that it is the Father’s breath in me which makes me love. Both spiritually and literally. And how all avenues have been blocked, sometimes comically, sometimes to the demise of birthing in me doubt. How little I can exert that I once had no problem, and how often I use my rescue inhaler, thankful that is even available. I confess to not hearing an ‘answer’ but I must admit that even in this, He is revealing Himself to me. Not so much as if He doesn’t care about my lungs, but I can honestly say that if I had found my lungs to be healed shortly after beginning to pray over them (5 years ago, maybe 4), I would not be here today, not in this present state. I know my self too well. Oh, good, all is well. Now what do I want to do next? I do not have answers for pain or prolonged lack of healing, but I am coming to know a Father who longs to meet us IN it. I would have never known had I not walked these last few years. Even so, I praise Him for His faithfulness, though I come up short on answers and breath. 😉

Hmmm. I appreciate your kind words. But I cannot take credit sir something that has been (And continues to be) not of myself. In my flesh I want it all fixed. It can be scary to be short of breath. But to learn to trust in spite of, well, that’s all Him, sistah ❤

As you shared here, it is only something He can do in us. And I am by no means perfect with this. I get afraid and am tempted to doubt His ability to care for me. When our flesh is SO accustomed to trying to work it out, learning to trust seems so anti-effective. I mean, what are you gonna DO about it 😉

Sue:I tried to reply to you earlier today at work using our public shared computer but got interrupted so many times I deleted it and waited till I was home—I had a like situation happen to myself just recently–My legs and stomach started hurting and I wondered if I could even go on working–So I asked Dad if He would heal me–He did not–So I got pissed and said to Him ok I will just figure it out for myself–Then one day I got the prompting to just Google up a question about what do I do with cramping legs and my stomach—The next thing I know I found out about these dietary supplement pills on Amazon for stomach and digestive systems and cramping legs not to mention heart strenghtheners and better prostrate health and more—Now Dad asked me–Hey Ken did you expect Me to heal you like I did with the folks in the Gospel stories? I said yes–He said well back then there were no pills but today there are so I led you to get them and your healed–Is that ok with you? I shut my mouth and just thanked Him—Your story is a thing of Glory–thanks!

Thanks so much for sharing your amazing story with me, Ken. Sorry to hear you had so much trouble with posting a reply on here! 😦

Yes, indeed, I also often thought that the drugs that are available to us today did not exist back then as Jesus walked on earth healing people. I still believe that God heals at times as He did through Jesus, but it is a rare thing, indeed.

I also did a lot of Google (re)search as my pains increased instead of getting less and less (after root canals, pulling of a nerve, treatment of gum inflammation, antibiotics etc). But whenever I thought I had a solution, another “new” tooth began to hurt, more and more. This truly leaves me clueless, still. The only thing I can do now is waiting on God. I still go to the dentist and to the oral surgeon, but my hope is not so much in them to save me from my pains although I believe in their abilities, too. However, if God does not open the door (and tells them or me what to do), who else can? 🙄

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